Rau

Rau 1. (Also: raupá) leaf of a plant, stem and leaves. 2. Hundred: e tahi te rau, e rua te rau, etc., 100, 200... Also seems to have been used in the meaning of 'many'. Tu'u henua rau, someone who has travelled to many countries (such were called in the 19th century natives who had travelled abroad, employed as sailors). Compare with: tai raurau-á riki. Vanaga.

Rau hei. 1. Branch of mimosa. 2. Killed enemy. 3. Hanged 'fish'. 'Branche du mimosa (signe de mort), ennemie túe (poisson suspendu)' according to Jaussen. Barthel.

Ra'u 1. To take something without the owner's permission; to seize something forcibly. 2. Ra'u maahu, ancient expression, literally: to appropriate the steam (maahu) of the food just taken out of an earth oven. It refers to intruders coming to help themselves uninvited. Warriors off to a battle used to be told: E ra'u maahu no koe, o pagaha'a! meaning: 'Eat little, lest you be heavy (and lose your agility).' Vanaga.

1. Sa.: la'u, to clear off, to carry away; la'u mai, to bring. Uvea: laku, to send, to throw into. Ha.: laulau, a bundle, a bag; a wrapper of a bundle, the netting in which food is carried; lalau, to seize, to catch hold of. 2. To.: lau, lalau, lauji, to pinch with the fingers, to nip. Ha.: lau, to feel after a thing; lalau, to extend (as the hand), to seize, to catch hold of. 3. Sa.: lau, a leaf; lalau, to be in leaf; laulau, a food tray plaited from a coconut leaf, to set out food on such a tray or on a table. To.: lau, lou, a leaf; laulau, a tray. Fu., Uvea, Nuguria: lau, a leaf. Niuē: lau, a leaf; laulau, a table. Ha.: lau, a leaf; laulau, the netting in which food is carried. Ma., Ta., Rarotonga, Rapanui, Paumotu, Nukuoro, Fotuna: rau, a leaf. Mgv.: rau, rou, id. Mq.: au, ou, id. Churchill 2.

Ta.: rauhuru, dry banana leaf. Mq.: auhuu, id. (To.: hulu, leaves dry and dead.) Ha.: lauhulu, banana leaf. Churchill.
Hei

1. Headband made of mahute and embellished with bird feathers. 2. Exclamation: hey! hullo! Hei pa'a, sterile woman. Hei para, 'ripening', this term refers to the time when such plants as the banana or sweet potato lose their fresh green colour and become yellow, which is taken as a symbol of bad omen or of death in the family. Vanaga.

Garland. P Mq.: hei, garland, necklace, chaplet, flower ornament. Ta.: hei, garland, chaplet, to entwine. Churchill.

Mgv.: heihei, to chase, to drive away. Ha.: heihei, to run a race. (The same suggestion of pursuit in running is to be seen in Sa.: taufetuli, commonly used as a plural of momo'e, to run, the literal sense being they-are-chasing-one-another.) Churchill.

Mq.: heikai, feikai, breadfruit cooked with coconut milk. Sa.: fai'ai', id. Churchill.
RAU

"Lau, s. Haw., to feel for, spread out, expand, be broad, numerous; s. leaf of a tree or plant, expanse, place where people dwell, the end, point; sc. extension of a thing; the number four hundred; lau-kua, to scrape together, to gather up from here and there confusedly; lau-la, broad, wide, extension, width; lau-na, so associate with, be friendly; lau-oho (lit. 'leaves of the head'), the hair.

Tong., lau, low, spread out, be broad, exfoliate; s. surface area; lau-mata, eyelash; lo, a leaf; lo-gnutu, the lips (lit. 'leaves of the mouth').

N. Zeal. and Mang., rau, spread, expand; raku-raku, to scratch, scrape.

Sam., lau, leaf, thatch, lip, brim of a cup, breadth, numeral hundred after the first hundred; lau-a, to be in leaf, full-leafed; laua-ai, a town, in opposition to the bush; lau-ulu, the hair of the head; launga-tasi, even, level; lau-lau, to lay out, spread out food on a table; lau-tata, a level place on a mountain or at its foot; lau-le-anga, uneven; lau-talinga, the lobe of the ear, a fungus; lau-tele, large, wide, common, of people.

Tah., rau, a leaf, a hundred; when counting by couples, two hundred; many indefinitely; rau-rau, to scratch.

Fiji., lou, leaves for covering an oven; longa, a mat, a bed for planting; drau, a leaf; drau-drau, leaves on which food is served up, also a hundred.

Saparua., laun, leaf. Mal., daun, id.; luwas, broad, extended. Sunda., Rubak., id., Amboyna, ai-low, id.

Malg., rav, ravin, leaf; ravin-tadign, lobe of the ear; lava, long, high, indefinite expression of extension; lava-lava, eternal; lava-tangh, a spider.

The word lau, in the sense of expanse, and hence 'the sea, ocean', is not now used in the Polynesian dialects. There remain, however, two compound forms to indicate its former use in that sense: lau-make, Haw., lit. the abating or subsiding of water, i.e., drought; rau-mate, Tah., to cease from rain, be fair weather; rau-mate, N. Zeal., id., hence summer.

The other word is koo-lau, Haw., kona-rau, N. Zeal., toe-rau, Tah., on the side of the great ocean, the weather side of an island or group; toa-lau, Sam., the north-east trade wind. In Fiji, lau is the name of the windward islands generally. In the Malay and pre-Malay dialects that word in that sense still remains under various forms: laut, lauti, lautan, lauhaha, olat, wolat, medi-laut, all signifying the sea, on the same principle of derivation as the Latin æquor, flat, level, expanse, the sea.

Welsh, llav, to expand; lled, breadth.

Armor., blad, flat, broad.

Lat., latus, broad, wide, spacious.

Greek, πλατυς, wide, broad, flat; πλατη, broad surface, blade of an oar; πλακοσ, broad, flat.

Pers., lâtû, blade of an oar, oar.

Lith., platus, flat.

Sanskr., prath, be extended, to spread.

Goth., laufs or laubs, a leaf. Icel., laug, bath; lauga, to bathe, lögr, the sea, water, moisture.

Bearing in mind l and n are convertible in the West Aryan as in the Polynesian dialects, we might refer to the following as original relatives of the Polynesian lau:

Sanskr., nau, boat, ship; snâ, and its connections, 'to bathe'.

Greek, ναω, to flow, float; ναω, νεω, to swim, to spin; νευσις, s. swimming; ναυς, ship, &c.

Lat., no-are, to swim, float. A.-Sax., naca, id. O. Norse, snäcka, a shell, sobriquet of boats and vessels. Perhaps the Gothic snaga, a garment.

Liddell and Scott and also Benfey refer the Greek νεω and Latin neo, 'to spin', to the Sanskrit nah, 'to bind, tie'. With due deference, I would suggest that the underlying sense of 'to bind' and 'tie' is 'to shorten, contract, to knit' - necto, nodus - and that the original conception of 'to spin' was one of extension, lengthening, as represented in the Polynesian lau."

(Fornander)